Cavs sign Jarell Martin to one-year deal, per report

Another player is set to get a shot at competing for a spot on the end of the Cavs’ roster.

As reported by ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski and cleveland.com’s Chris Fedor, the Cleveland has signed Jarell Martin to a one-year, non-guaranteed deal. Martin, 25, is a 6’10” forward originally picked by the Grizzlies in the first-round of the 2015 NBA Draft out of LSU. He spent last season with the Magic, appearing in 42 games with averages of 7.8 minutes, 2.7 points and 1.7 rebounds per game.

Martin joins ex-Clipper Sindarius Thornwell (signed to a one-year deal), summer league standout Marques Bolden and Exhibit 10 signee J.P. Macura as candidates to make Cleveland’s roster. Currently, the Cavs have 13 guaranteed contracts on the roster and are expected to carry an open roster spot into the season — meaning there’s one spot on the roster up for grabs.

Thornwell, due to his defensive upside and track record of being a useful NBA player, would appear to be the clubhouse leader to make the roster. Martin would appear to be facing a logjam in the frontcourt, where Kevin Love, Larry Nance Jr., Tristan Thompson, John Henson and Ante Zizic all have guaranteed contracts. Perhaps he could end up on a two-way contract where he splits time between Cleveland and the Canton Charge.

As a player, Martin rates out as solid defensively, but as a negative on offense. The caveat, of course, is that he only played in in 328 minutes last year. His shot chart does indicate that there’s some three-and-d potential there from the four spot. With the Magic last year, he shot 35.1% on 1.5 attempts per game, which isn’t nothing in his limited amount of minutes. It’ll be interesting to see what he looks like in training camp, and what kind of shot the team is willing to give him.